


(still I wake up in the morning) thinking of you

by carolinecrane



Category: The Good Place (TV)
Genre: 5+1 Things, F/M, Fluff and Humor, Soulmates
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-10-06
Updated: 2017-10-06
Packaged: 2019-01-09 20:47:18
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,624
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12284127
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/carolinecrane/pseuds/carolinecrane
Summary: Eleanor and Chidi keep finding their way back to each other, until finally they don't have to anymore.Or, Five Times Eleanor and Chidi's meet-cute was a little bit ugly, and the one time Michael finally gave up on trying to keep them apart.





	(still I wake up in the morning) thinking of you

**Author's Note:**

  * For [klutzy_girl](https://archiveofourown.org/users/klutzy_girl/gifts).



**Attempt #56**

_Bikes are stupid,_ Eleanor thought as she scowled down at the thing. Seriously, this is why she drove a car back when she was alive. It didn’t make any sense that there weren’t any cars in The Good Place; shouldn’t they all be zipping around in convertible Maseratis? Hadn’t they earned that by being such amazing people while they were on Earth?

When she’d asked Michael about it he’d yammered something about fossil fuels and emissions and how most people in the Good Place had used public transportation as much as possible while they were alive. Public transportation! Like Eleanor was going to ride the bus now that she was dead.

“So stupid,” she muttered as she climbed onto the bike, feeling it wobble under her as she pointed it down the cobblestone street. And that was another thing. Everything was cobblestones, and they were supposed to ride _bikes_ around on them? It didn’t make any sense. This was supposed to be paradise, not...

Eleanor’s thoughts were derailed as her bike slammed into something solid, sending her and the bike flying backwards. She landed hard on the cobblestones, jarring her tailbone right in the spot that made her whole body kind of vibrate with pain. 

“Fudge!” she shouted. “Bikes are bullshirt!”

She looked around for the bike in question, fully intending to kick it until she felt better -- or broke a toe, whichever came first -- when her gaze landed on the thing she’d hit. Only it wasn’t a _thing_ , it was a man, and he was currently lying in the middle of the road, eyes closed and looking for all the world like he was dead.

“Shirt,” Eleanor muttered, levering herself up off the ground with some effort and crawling over to the person she’d just run over. “I killed someone. My first murder and it’s in The Good Place. How does that even work? Do I have to go to Heck now?”

Eleanor paused and looked around, but there was no one there to witness her crime. “Seriously, I can’t even say ‘heck’?”

It was frustrating, to say the least, but a second later the dead guy blinked his eyes open to stare up at her through slightly askew glasses, and Eleanor remembered that they were already dead, so they probably couldn’t die again.

“Are you okay?” she asked, reaching out to help him up, and when their hands touched she felt a weird tingle all the way down her arm. “Huh.”

“I think so,” the guy said, letting Eleanor pull him into a sitting position. “I guess I wasn’t looking where I was going. I found this great bookshop and their collection of books on Stoicism is quite impressive.”

She glanced down for the first time and saw a pile of books scattered across the road next to them. They were the thick kind like she’d had to lug around in high school, but she’d always assumed people stopped reading those kinds of books when they weren’t being forced to anymore.

“Nerd,” Eleanor said, but it came out almost fondly, which was weird, considering she didn’t even know this particular nerd.

“I’m Chidi, by the way,” he said, flashing a smile that made Eleanor’s stomach do a totally weird backflip as he held out his hand.

“Eleanor,” she answered, shaking his hand and then just...not letting go. “Listen, we should probably get you somewhere you can sit down for a little while. My house isn’t far from here, we can go there. Just don’t make eye contact with any of the clowns and you’ll be fine.”

“Clowns?” Chidi repeated, frowning as she helped him up. 

“It’s a long story,” Eleanor answered. She paused long enough to collect his nerdy books, then she slid an arm around his waist to support his weight and steered him in the direction of her house. She didn’t look back at the bike that lay abandoned in the middle of the road. It was stupid anyway.

***

**Attempt #184**

“This is weird, right?” Eleanor said to no one in particular as she glanced around the grocery store.

“Excuse me?” the man behind her in line said, reaching up to adjust his glasses with the hand that wasn’t holding a bunch of bananas -- organic because _of course_ \-- in a death grip. “Are you talking to me?”

“No, but you’ll do,” she answered, turning toward the guy and gesturing around them with her bottle of Skinny Girl Vodka. “I’m just saying, don’t you think this is weird?”

“The...grocery store?”

“Yes!” Eleanor nearly shouted, so relieved to finally find someone who understood her. “The grocery store! I mean, this is The Good Place, right? Why are we still being forced to go _grocery shopping_? Shouldn’t the food just appear when we want it? Why do we even need to eat at all?”

“I’m not sure it’s so much that we _need_ to eat as people enjoy the food,” the man said, watching warily as the bottle of vodka swung a little too close for comfort. 

Eleanor blinked at him for a couple seconds, then blinked down at her vodka. “Well, I do enjoy vodka, so you may have a point.”

“I’m sorry,” the guy said, frowning at Eleanor with a mixture of confusion and, she suspected, amusement. “Have we met before?”

“You look like you’re too smart to hang out with me,” Eleanor said, “so probably not. But I could be into it, I think.”

“Excuse me?” the guy said, reaching up to adjust his glasses again like maybe he was trying to get a better look at her. Or maybe he was just nervous. Either way, she could work with it.

“I’m Eleanor.”

“Chidi.”

“Gesundheit.”

“No, my _name_ is Chidi. I’m a professors of ethics and...I’m sorry, it’s just, are you _sure_ we haven’t met?”

Eleanor shrugged and moved up the line as the person in front of her finally finished with their groceries and moved along. “Pretty sure, dude, but if you want to come to my place we can put our heads together and try to figure out why you think we have.”

She wasn’t really expecting him to say yes. He didn’t look like he was expecting to say yes, either, so it surprised them both when he shrugged and said, “Okay.”

“Okay,” Eleanor repeated, sliding her vodka along the belt to the clerk even though The Good Place didn’t require any money. So basically they just forced people to stand around in lines talking to strangers for no reason, which didn’t sound much like something that would happen in Paradise. For once, Eleanor couldn’t say she minded all that much.

She took the bag the cashier handed her and stepped forward, waiting at the end of the register for Chidi to get a bag for his bananas. Eleanor watched the easy way he smiled at the clerk, listened to the comforting sound of his voice as he thanked her, and found herself smiling for no reason.

“Okay,” she murmured to herself, voice soft and full of a hope she couldn’t explain.

***

**Attempt #402**

The bookstore was wedged between a frozen yogurt place and a candle shop that smelled like somebody’s grandmother’s house. Eleanor walked past it at least a dozen times without taking any notice of it all, but once she figured out that they didn’t carry _The National Enquirer_ or even _People_ at the grocery store, she decided a bookstore was probably her best bet.

And okay, she’d had to ask that weirdly cheerful robot where she could find magazines in the neighborhood, which had taken way too long, because Eleanor still couldn’t remember her name. She’d finally spotted Jennifer/Jessie/Janine talking to someone else outside a weird church-looking building and shouldered the guy out of the way to ask her question.

“There’s a bookstore just down Main Street,” Jasmine/Jessica/Joyce had said, with a smile that looked like it hurt her face.

“No, I didn’t ask about books,” Eleanor had answered with a roll of her eyes, but the guy who’d been talking to Jerrica/Jordan/Janice tapped her on the shoulder and said, “They sell magazines in bookstores.”

The way he’d said it had been really judgey, too, like she was stupid for not knowing that. But like, of _course_ she didn’t know that, she didn’t go to bookstores. Only nerds hung out at bookstores, everyone knew that. Case in point, the nerd scanning the shelves nearest the door when she opened it and walked inside, blinking at the sudden change from bright sunlight to soft, yellow lamplight.

Weird, just like the concept of buying books on purpose, but Eleanor kept her opinions to herself and followed the shelves until she found the magazines all the way at the back. 

They were mostly boring, weird science journals and nature magazines and those giant books with the old people puzzles in them. She was rifling through them, searching high and low for any sign of an _Us Weekly_ when someone cleared their throat behind her.

“Hello,” the guy said when she spun around, half a copy of _Travel and Leisure_ still clutched in her hand.

“Do you work here?” she asked, because for some reason there were people in The Good Place who actually _wanted_ jobs, and this guy looked geeky enough to spend eternity running a bookstore.

“No,” he answered, then he looked around the store as though he was expecting someone else to appear. “I don’t think anyone does.”

“You’re not one of those overly cheerful robots, are you?”

“No,” he said again, with a little smile this time, and Eleanor didn’t let herself think about how nice it looked on him. “I’m fairly sure Janet’s the only artificial intelligence around.”

“Well maybe _Janet_ can tell me why there’s not a single forking entertainment magazine in this place,” Eleanor grumbled, turning back to the shelf she’d been ransacking. “ _National Review_. What are they reviewing, how to bore people to death?”

The guy behind her let out a little chuckle, and Eleanor ignored the way it made her stomach flutter. “It’s possible. That one’s about politics, mostly. Fairly conservative views, not really my cup of tea.”

“Doesn’t that seem weird to you?” Eleanor asked, turning to face him again. “Why would anyone want to read about politics after they’re dead? If I didn’t know better I’d think we were in The Bad Place.”

For a moment the guy just looked at her, like maybe he was actually wondering if that’s what was going on, but before the thought caught on he reached behind her and plucked something off the top shelf. “Is this what you’re looking for?”

Eleanor snatched the single, pristine copy of _Entertainment Weekly_ out of his hands. “Oh thank God, this really _is_ The Good Place. There’s no way The Bad Place would have something as heavenly as the Adam Levine issue of _Entertainment Weekly_ just lying around, right?”

The guy just frowned at her again, but he was kind of smiling, too. Eleanor didn’t even know people’s faces could do that, but she had to admit she didn’t hate it.

“Well, it was nice meeting you...”

“Eleanor,” she said, still clutching Adam Levine’s face to her chest.

“I’m Chidi.” He held out his hand and she took it in one of hers, sucking in a surprised breath when she felt sparks run through her fingers.

“Yeah, nice meeting you too or whatever,” she answered, but it took her a few more seconds to let go of his hand. “Thanks for the magazine.”

“Glad I could help.” He smiled and turned away from her, heading for the counter to pick up a stack of books before he let himself out of the shop. When he reached the door he glanced back, giving her one more smile before he disappeared out into the street. It wasn’t until he’d already gone that she realized she hadn’t asked where he lived or how to contact him.

“Oh, well, I can always ask Jeanine. Julia? Juanita. Farts, why is it so hard to remember that name?” she asked herself, already flipping through her magazine as she followed Chidi out of the bookstore.

***

**Attempt #757**

The movie theater was a pleasant surprise. Eleanor had literally stumbled into it while ducking a couple overly chatty neighbors she’d spotted coming down the street toward her. She’d pulled open the first door she spotted and ducked inside just to spare herself one more inane conversation about the progress of their flower garden, but when she looked around and realized she was in an actual theater, she forgot all about her neighbors.

The place had three screens, one showing some lame romantic comedy, one an action movie with lots of explosions, and one some weird art film with subtitles. Eleanor ordered frozen yogurt from the guy behind the counter, because apparently they didn’t have popcorn in The Good Place, then she made her way to the theater showing the action movie.

When she got there the place was empty, so she headed straight for the middle seat in the center row and put her feet up on the chair in front of her. Nothing was happening on the screen yet, and she wondered idly if they showed previews for coming attractions in the afterlife or if they’d just get right into the movie

Either way was fine with her, since she didn’t have a phone to occupy her time now that she was dead. Which was bullshirt, as far as she was concerned, because her phone had practically been her favorite part of living, besides booze, and they had plenty of that here, so why didn’t they have phones too?

She’d been sitting there for a few minutes when someone else walked in. The guy had glasses and close-cropped hair, and he was wearing a nerdy button-up shirt with a pair of khakis. He looked around the theater for a minute, then he walked up the stairs to her row and took the seat one away from hers.

“Hi,” he said, flashing a smile that made Eleanor kind of warm and squirmy in a way she did not approve of at _all_.

“Hi,” she answered anyway, frowning at the seat between them. “I guess they don’t believe in previews here.”

“Perhaps their goal is to get us to talk to one another,” he said, and when she frowned at him, he added, “You know, get to know one another while we wait. I’m Chidi.”

“Eleanor,” she said, taking the hand he offered. “That’s a stupid goal. And honestly, you don’t really seem like the action movie type.”

“Oh,” he said, suddenly serious, “No. This theater is showing _Ikiru_. The classic existential masterpiece by Akira Kurosawa? It’s about a dying man’s journey of self-discovery.”

“Seriously? That sounds boring as fork,” she said, glancing around as though maybe she’d missed a sign. “I thought this was the theater for _Die Hard With a Vengeance_.”

Chidi pursed his lips like maybe he was going to tell her exactly what he thought about the Die Hard franchise, which would be a mistake, because it was definitely a fight he wouldn’t win. But instead he just said, “I assure you it’s not boring at all. It’s actually quite a moving story.”

“Yeah, gonna take your word for it,” Eleanor said, then she stood up. “It was nice to meet you, Cheeto, but I’m going to leave you to your nerdy subtitles and go watch things explode.”

“Chidi,” he called after her.

“Whatever,” she said, waving over her shoulder without looking back.

****

***

**Attempt #950**

Not for nothing, but Eleanor was pretty sure they made a mistake about her soulmate. Sure, she wasn’t exactly the best person in life, and she’d made a few questionable choices when it came to hooking up, but the person they _thought_ she was surely never would have ended up with someone like Trevor.

At first Eleanor didn’t mind. He was kind of funny, in a mean sort of way, which Eleanor could totally relate to. A lot of the people in the neighborhood were total nerds, after all, and standing around at cocktail parties making fun of them with her soulmate was the only real entertainment they had.

The trouble was that a lot of them were really _sweet_ nerds, and even Eleanor started to feel a little bad when they kept inviting her to parties no matter how drunk or mean she got. She wasn’t even sure why she felt so bad, because she’d never let it bother her when it happened while she was alive. Must be something in the air, she figured, making her a better person whether she wanted to be or not.

It wasn’t working on Trevor, though, because it seemed like the more guilty Eleanor felt, the meaner and louder he got. She’d spent half the party they were currently attending trying to ditch him, and she wasn’t an expert or anything, but that didn’t seem like something soulmates should want to do.

The only upside to this particular party was that the house where it was being held was huge, so there were lots of places to hide. At the moment she was wedged into the corner or a balcony, half-hidden by a curtain and clutching her third drink of the night. It occurred to her that she might have an easier time avoiding Trevor if she kept a clear head, but then she’d really be bored out of her mind, so she decided to take her chances with the booze.

“Oh, hello,” an unfamiliar voice said somewhere above Eleanor, and she looked up into the face of an unfairly beautiful woman. “I’m Tahani. I don’t believe we’ve met?”

“Eleanor,” Eleanor said, clutching her drink a little tighter. “I’m hiding.”

“I see,” Tahani said, smiling in a sad sort of way, like maybe she thought there was something wrong with Eleanor. “Well there’s no need for that, everyone here is quite friendly. And as it’s my party, it’s my duty as the hostess to ensure you’re having a wonderful time.”

Before Eleanor could argue she found her arm looped through Tahani’s, then she was dragged from her hiding place and back into the party. She tried to struggle, but Tahani was clearly some gorgeous supernatural creature, because her grip was _strong_. Plus, Eleanor didn’t want to spill her drink, so there was that.

They crossed the fancy room with its marble floors and its gilt decor, Tahani floating along like some ethereal wood sprite and Eleanor stumbling in her wake.

“You simply must meet my soulmate, Chidi,” Tahani said as she floated to a stop in front of a smiling man with nerdy glasses and the air of someone who’d gotten his ass kicked a lot as a kid. “Darling, this is Eleanor. I found her hiding on the balcony, shy little thing that she is. Isn’t that just adorable?”

“Actually, I was kind of hiding from my...”

“Eleanor! There you are, you little tease,” Trevor shouted across the room, and Eleanor sighed and resigned herself to her fate. Tahani’s grip on her arm tightened just a little, and Eleanor glanced at Chidi in time to watch his jaw sort of twitch. Then Trevor was on her, dropping an arm around her shoulders and jostling her just this side of too hard. 

“Making friends without me? I see you’ve met the old ball and chain,” Trevor said, smirking as he gave Tahani a once-over. “Can you believe this party? It’s like they found the most boring people in the neighborhood and locked them all in a room. And what’s with all the gold around here?”

“Tahani, Chidi, this is my...soulmate. Trevor, this is Tahani and her soulmate Chidi. It’s their party.”

“No shirt, really?” Trevor said, eyes wide with delight, probably at the realization that he’d just insulted their hostess to her face. And normally Eleanor wouldn’t care that much, but Tahani really did seem nice, if a little condescending, and there was something sort of comforting about Chidi’s quiet presence.

“That’s forking amazing,” Trevor went on, jostling Eleanor a little more as he laughed. “You sure do like gold, huh? Maybe ask Michael to tone it down a little for you. The glare might kill someone if the light catches them just right.”

“Well, we’re so happy the two of you could join us tonight,” Tahani said, smiling around the tick in her jaw. “Though I must say, I don’t recall meeting either of you to issue an invitation?”

“Oh, no, we totally gatecrashed,” Trevor answered. He snagged a champagne flute from a passing waiter, dragging Eleanor sideways with him as he leaned over far enough to reach it. As soon as he had his drink he let go of her, sending her stumbling backwards so he could sidle up to Tahani and throw an arm around her shoulders instead. “Though now that I’m here, I’d be seriously into a tour. This place is forking massive.”

Before anyone could object he was dragging Tahani away, leaving a stunned Eleanor staring after them and a concerned Chidi blinking at her. “Are you all right?”

“Oh, sure,” she answered, smoothing down her dress. “He’s just...a lot.”

Chidi made a noncommittal humming noise that Eleanor was pretty sure meant, “No shit.”

“But he’s your soulmate, so you must have some fundamental compatibility.”

“I mean, I have been known to enjoy making fun of people at parties,” Eleanor admitted, “but he’s a little much, even for me.”

Chidi nodded and leaned a little closer, lowering his voice like he was going to confess something. “To be honest, Tahani can be a bit much to take as well. She’s beautiful and well-versed in the arts and we have quite a bit in common, but she seemed to have quite a few famous friends while she was alive, and she likes to talk about them. A lot.”

“No shirt? What, was she part of Taylor’s crew or something?”

“I have no idea what that means,” Chidi admitted, a cute little frown making his forehead wrinkle right in the middle, then he sighed and his shoulders sort of drooped. “But it’s not unlikely.”

“This is so weird,” Eleanor said, glancing around at all the other soulmates in the room, all of them laughing and smiling at each other like they’d never been so happy. “Don’t you think it’s weird that our supposed soulmates are so perfect for us on the surface, but so completely _wrong_ deep down?”

“Are you saying that Trevor person is perfect for you on the surface?”

“Hey, I’m not proud of it, okay?”

“I think you might have a point, though,” Chidi said, charitably moving past the whole ‘your soulmate’s kind of a douchebag’ portion of the conversation. “Soulmates should really complement one another, not...”

“Wait, compliment? Like, ‘your smile is like sunshine, Chidi’, or ‘I find your presence really reassuring, Chidi’, that kind of thing?”

For a second Chidi just blinked at her, then a soft smile turned up his lips and lit up the room. “You think I have a nice smile?”

“Not the point,” Eleanor said, hiding her blush behind the last of her martini.

Chidi nodded and cleared his throat. “Actually I meant _complement_ , as in two things that enhance or complete one another. It seems to me that soulmates would be two people whose differences fill the gaps in one another’s personalities, not two copies of the same person.”

“Yeah, that,” Eleanor said, swaying a little closer, and maybe it was the liquid courage talking, but it felt like maybe Chidi could fill her gaps better than Trevor ever could. She opened her mouth to say so, but before she got the words out a hand clamped down on her shoulder, making her wince as she was drawn back into Trevor’s side.

“Thanks for keeping the little missus company, Chachi,” Trevor said, flashing a sharp smile in Chidi’s direction. “But I think this little minx needs to get to bed, if you know what I mean, and I think you do.”

Before she could argue Eleanor was being dragged away, but she glanced over her shoulder to wave at Chidi and Tahani as they stared helplessly after her.

***

Michael let out a defeated sigh as he watched the footage from Tahani’s latest welcome party. He’d known calling Trevor in again was a bad idea; he _always_ overplayed his hand, the cocky bastard. Michael told him to keep Eleanor away from Tahani’s party, that there was no way she wouldn’t figure it out if she was thrust among them like that, but he just had to prove that he could keep her from figuring it out, even with Tahani and Chidi right there in her face.

Of course he’d laid it on way too thick, which was saying something, considering he’d even managed to annoy Eleanor. Then he’d gone and left her alone with Chidi, and of course they’d started to figure it out immediately. 950 times they’d been through this, 949 resets and with each one Sean’s patience wore a little more thin.

It didn’t make sense that they kept finding each other even when everyone in the neighborhood worked together to keep them apart. It was almost like...but no, that couldn’t be. They’d both been sent to The Bad Place, and the only way to have an actual soulmate was...

“Figure it out yet?” a voice said to his right, and Michael reared back in his chair to stare at a smug-looking Gabriel leaning against the edge of his desk. His stupid white wings were fluttering behind him, showing off as usual, and he looked so pleased with himself that Michael knew without a doubt what had been the fatal flaw in his plan all along.

“That’s impossible,” he said anyway, because it didn’t make any sense.

Gabriel shrugged, then he let out a sigh that grated Michael’s nerves. “An unfortunate accounting error. Of course, we figured it out ages ago, but we thought we’d let you have your fun. Everybody upstairs has had a great time watching. We put it on a big screen and all the souls gathered around, people made bets on when Eleanor and Chidi would find each other this time. It’s been a real bonding experience.”

Michael felt the steam coming out of his ears, but he held on to his human suit. He wouldn’t let Gabriel goad him into a literal meltdown, not this time. He may have been bested by an angel -- again -- but he wasn’t going to give Gabriel the satisfaction of watching him lose his cool.

“And they say we’re the evil ones,” Michael snarled, eyes narrowing when Gabriel just smirked.

“We take our fun where we can, Brother,” Gabriel said, then he stood up and clapped his hands together. “Now, I’ve come to collect my wayward souls, and you demons can all get back to torturing souls that deserve it. Oh, except for you, I suppose. I hear Sean’s making you retire. Tough break.”

Michael gritted his teeth so hard he could hear the bone cracking. Gabriel was probably planning a party to celebrate Michael being launched into the sun, and Eleanor and Chidi would be the guests of honor. He stood up with as much dignity as he could muster, then he straightened his suit and nodded toward the door.

“I’ll take you to them.”

“Good sport,” Gabriel said, clapping Michael on the shoulder on his way by, and Michael privately wondered if he could get away with one more bit of torture before his forced retirement began.


End file.
